The Epstein list: Bill Clinton and Donald Trump appear in unsealed documents

Dozens of court documents related to the convicted sex felon Jeffrey Epstein and unsealed Wednesday include the names of several prominent figures. Among them: former President Bill Clinton and former President Donald Trump. Neither Clinton nor Trump have been accused of any wrongdoing related to Epstein, who killed himself in a Manhattan jail while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.

The documents — which total nearly 1,000 pages — were part of a 2015 defamation lawsuit brought against Epstein and his former girlfriend and convicted accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, by Virginia Giuffre, one of their accusers.

In the documents, Giuffre alleged that many of sexual encounters occurred under the guise of massages that Maxwell, a British socialite, procured for Epstein and others.

Giuffre claimed that while she was a teenager, Epstein and Maxwell pressured her into sexual encounters with powerful men, including Prince Andrew. Giuffre reached an out-of-court settlement with Andrew, who denied her allegations.

U.S. District Judge Loretta A. Preska ordered the unsealing of the documents in mid-December, saying that most of the information and names in them were already public.

The newly unsealed documents include the transcript of a 2016 deposition in which a second accuser, identified as Johanna Sjoberg, testified that Epstein “said one time that Clinton likes them young, referring to girls.” She did not elaborate.

Sjoberg testified that Epstein told her he would take her to Trump’s Atlantic City casino but did not allege any wrongdoing. She also said in a deposition that Prince Andrew had inappropriately touched her at Epstein’s mansion in New York.

In all, Clinton’s name appears 73 times in the documents unsealed Wednesday; Trump’s name appears four times.

What was Clinton’s relationship with Epstein?

The former president has acknowledged that he had flown on Epstein’s plane and had met with the jet-setting financier on several occasions.

In previously released court documents, Giuffre said that she met Clinton on Epstein’s private Caribbean island but did not accuse him of any wrongdoing. Clinton denied ever visiting the island, and she later retracted the claim.

In 2019, after Epstein was arraigned on federal sex-trafficking charges, Clinton’s office released a statement saying the former president knew “nothing about the terrible crimes” Epstein was accused of.

Epstein hanged himself at the Metropolitan Correctional Center a month later.

Trump and Epstein were longtime friends well before Trump became president.

“I’ve known Jeff for 15 years,” Trump told New York magazine in 2002. “Terrific guy. He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”

In 2005, Epstein was arrested in Palm Beach, Fla., on charges he paid a 14-year-old girl for sex.

In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty in Florida to state charges of soliciting and procuring a person under age 18 for prostitution. Under the terms of a secret agreement his attorneys cut with then-Miami U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta, Epstein was sentenced to 13 months in county jail, with daily work-release privileges, and a related federal probe into potential crimes was dropped.

He was required to reach financial settlements with dozens of his victims and register as a sex offender, but Epstein could have faced up to life in prison if he had been convicted on federal charges.